


A Little Black Box

by orphan_account



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Birthday, Drabble, F/M, Gen, felicity's birthday, olicity - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-10
Updated: 2014-12-10
Packaged: 2018-02-28 22:22:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2749298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Felicity's birthday.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Little Black Box

"Are you coming with us?" Roy asked with a smile that almost hid the pain in his eyes, and Felicity waved the team off.

"I just want to finish something really quick—I’ll meet you guys there," Felicity smiled at him, hoping it looked genuine.

"Felicity, It’s your birthday. I think you can hold off one—” Roy started, but Digg stopped him with a light hand on his arm.

"We’ll meet you at the restaurant," Digg said, nodding in understanding at her. She needed a minute of alone time. A minute to clear her head.

It had been an exhausting day, trying to smile as Digg, Roy, and Lyla made the best of a crappy situation. Although Oliver’s absence weigh heavily on them all, they had pushed through it, complete with dinner reservations and silly little gifts that seemed so out of place they fit, and Felicity had responded as she should the entire time.

But she was tired. As the door out of the foundry shut behind them, her smile slipped from her face, and she plopped down in her chair, resting her head in her hands.

She had been looking forward to this day, only a couple months ago. One night when her and Oliver had been watching some old movie in her apartment, she had admitted to him that she had never done much for her birthdays. She had confided that, although her mom tried and tried extravagantly to plan a party for her, there was never anybody to invite. And the few times her mom had planned something great for the two of them, she had been called in to work at the last minute. The plans always fell through.

Felicity was never mad though—disappointed, maybe. But after so many fallen expectations, birthdays came off their ever-high pedestal. They were just another day.

"We’re going to do something great this year," Oliver had promised that night, and it had been so easy to believe him. That summer, everything with Oliver had been hopeful. Everything seemed possible. And then it all went away.

Felicity sighed into her arms, resting them on the keyboard. She knew she was pushing buttons that she shouldn’t, and that normally she would have yelled at herself for being so careless, but not then. She let herself, for that small moment, sink into herself think about how much it hurt that Oliver had left.

It hurt more than their conversation in the hospital. More than his refusal to lead a different life after Sara’s death. It even topped that feeling she’d had when he had told Cupid he could never be with anyone—that feeling like all the wind was knocked out of her and she could hardly breathe.

Oliver leaving though, was different. There was no fight. No discussion. He was gone suddenly and swiftly, with a simple goodbye in her ear before static replaced his breaths.

She didn’t have a chance to say anything.

That’s what hurt the most.

She cried a lot that first night, after slamming the comm so hard into the table it shattered. She had slept in Oliver’s bed in the foundry, hoping willing that he would show up, asking why the hell she was sleeping there.

He didn’t.

So the next morning, she made the bed like she had never been there, washed her face, wiped her eyes, and left. She hadn’t cried since.

Felicity was started out of her thoughts by a dinging of her computer, and she looked up miserably, straightening her glasses.

The computer flashed in front of her, prompting her to open the alert box in front of it.

Look in the box on the cabinet.

It read simply before she turned off the alarm that had been set. She looked around the foundry in confusion, eyes resting on a small cabinet in the back corner, where Oliver’s abandoned bed was.

She approached it tentatively, opening the creaking doors. It was filled with extra clothes, a blanket, and other mismatched items—a bottle of scotch. One of Sara’s pacifiers. And a large cardboard box.

Felicity pulled it down carefully, resting it on the bed, and froze a moment at the contents.

It was filled with memories of Oliver. A stack of pictures: Oliver and Thea when they were little, their entire family—alive and healthy, pictures of Oliver and Tommy—Oliver’s hair longer, and Tommy’s eyes glinting mischievously, a picture of Oliver, Roy, Digg, and Lyla in their kitchen. Felicity paused on the last one in the stack, eyes widening as one of her hands covered her mouth in a gasp.

It was her and Oliver, unposed in the foundry. Her head was thrown back in laughter. She looked careless and free. Oliver was shooting her a look that was half-warning, half-delight as his hand rested lightly on her arm.

They looked happy.

Felicity felt foreign tears brim her eyes and she dropped the worn picture next to the box, skipping over a couple of CDs before she came across a small box, wrapped in plain red wrapping paper. Her name was written sloppily on a small scrap of paper taped to the top.

Felicity, I love you. I’m sorry I couldn’t be there.

-Oliver

She gasped an ugly cry at the apology, setting the paper carefully next to the picture of them. She wiped her eyes and sat down gently on the bed staring at the small box, turning it over and over in her hands, before finally mustering up the courage to open the paper. She unwrapped it slowly, revealing a small black box inside.

She recognized the small star that little Sara owned as well, although this time it hung off a smaller chain. A bracelet.

Felicity picked it up from the box, slipping the cold metal onto her wrist, she paused though, when she felt a small divot on the back of the pendant, and turned it over.

Happy Birthday, Felicity.

It read in small, almost illegible letters. Felicity let out a tearful, humorless laugh at the words, imagining Oliver’s lips forming them in front of her. She smiled through her tears.

Oliver was with her, on her birthday—He was thinking about her. Even if he couldn’t be there in the flesh.


End file.
